Review: Bloodborne
Game Reviews
Bloodborne
From Software / SCE
Reviewed on: PS4 (exclusive)
Street: 03.24
The spiritual successor to Demon’s Souls and the Dark Souls games, Bloodborne will spit in your face and dare you to do something about it. At this point, you’ve probably either enjoyed the From Software games or you think they’re too goddamn hard to bother with, but Bloodborne is the game that can bridge that gap. It’s just as difficult as its predecessors, but not as punishing, and it’s significantly more interesting in terms of lore, environments, weapons and enemy types. I loved Dark Souls 1 and 2, but I always gave up around the halfway mark. I’m not a fucking masochist, and that shit gets ridiculous. Bloodborne, however, does not steal health from you when you die, and its Regain System allows the deep third person melee combat to reach what was—for me—a perfect balance of challenge and reward. Bloodborne is a beautifully macabre trip, a world of fascinating detail—a world you must dominate in order to experience. The sense of accomplishment in doing so is, for my money, among the most profound in any game. If it weren’t for a few aggravating bugs I encountered along the way, it would be a modern gaming masterpiece. –Jesse Hawlish